'Fixing' his tractor on the deck today.
Thomas is once again his favorite place to play
Future NHLer... i think so.
Working on that monster slap shot
Being ornery on his truck and not wanting to take a picture. In 10 years when his friends find this picture on the internet of him looking 'special' maybe he'll realize what a poor decision that really was.
Helping with the yard work
Just wanted to do a quick update from the weekend's events.
As mentioned in the pictures, his giant Thomas the Train pop-up tent deal is once again Ethan's favorite place to play. We spent quite a bit of time in there last winter, and now he's re-discovering how much he enjoys it. Ethan and I spend quite a bit of time in there each day. We play with his cars, we wrestle, we do puzzles, read books, build towers with his blocks... basically whatever it is he tells me we are going to do is what we do. It's a lot of fun though. The other day he had his cars in there and I tried to play with them and he took them all away from me and declared 'no cars for you!' I had flashbacks to the Soup Nazi episode of Seinfeld. If you don't know what that is, I feel sorry for you. Anyway, I attempted another approach and asked if I could play with his cars. I was once again turned down... Instead, I was told I had to cry. I said no. He said, 'daddy, CRY!'. So, I pretended to cry, he gave me a hug and said, 'its okay, daddy... here you go.' and handed me a car to play with. This little game continues each day. He takes stuff away from me, I have to cry and then Ethan ends up looking like the hero and gives me a toy to play with. 30 years old... and getting bullied by a 2 year. Somewhere, something went very, very wrong...
Previously, I mentioned that we build towers with his blocks... this is actually a rather frustrating experience for me. Lately, I've been building the tower, and then adding a garage on the side so he can park all his toy cars in it. Now, most of you may not know this, but I'm more of less the Frank Lloyd Wright of Mega Block tower building. When I start, I have this idea of how I want it to look and what direction the building should go. However, the boss, a.k.a. Ethan, doesn't 'share' in my vision 99% of the time. He randomly slaps blocks into place that have no business being there. Not only does it ruin the aesthetic value of the tower... it totally undermines the structural stability as well. I often want to move and re-arrange the places he puts the blocks, but as painful as it is, more often than not I just let it go because in the end its really about Ethan's enjoyment... not mine. Big of me, huh? I just wish his block placement had SOME sort of logic... that's not asking too much. Is it? Though, the other day Ethan was pulling his OCD routine and lining blocks up in a straight line.... but he was blocking the garage I was building so I attempted to move them and Ethan went ballistic. So, I calmed him down and moved the blocks and we lined them back up... But, I decided to mess with him a little bit after that and knock a couple of the blocks over. He found that less than amusing and started crying. Whoops. So, once again I calmed him down and we set them back up. Apparently I need to work on his toughness...
Yesterday, Ethan more than made my morning with just 5 words... 'Daddy, we play hockey outside?' Heck yeah! We have been playing in the driveway on a pretty regular basis but usually I have to ask him to play. I must say, he has gotten markedly better than at the beginning of summer when we got back. Yesterday, I bet he hit 8 out of every 10 balls that he swung at. At the beginning of the summer he was probably missing 8 out of every 10. And, most of the ones he was hitting were ones that I had passed to him so he was successfully hitting moving targets as well. I was impressed. Yesterday's weather wasn't the best, so Ethan asked if we could go inside and play... thankfully an unfinished basement provides the a good alternative to the outdoors. Even slapshots as hard as Ethan and mine care can't damage cement walls. We had a good time playing for a while downstairs... then I put my hockey helmet on and Ethan decided to change the game into throwing the ball and hitting me in the face/helmet, laughing hysterically, chasing down the ball and doing it all again. He has a twisted sense of humor... Along the lines of sports, we were also playing catch today in the yard and again Ethan has made big leaps in improvement. At the beginning of the summer you had NO idea where his throws were going. Towards you, towards the ground, behind him, etc.... it was anyone's guess. Today, every throw was at least in my direction and 75% of them were catchable. So, that was cool. He also did pretty well catching the ball.... well, the ones I didn't accidentally bounce of his melon. Its not my fault he has a big head...
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